A Complete Explanation Of Everything

Indeed.

Last Sunday, I spent the afternoon with a couple of hundred Polish ex-pats, at the "Great Annual Polish Christmas Charity Event" (or something very like that), in the heart of Dublin, at the Temple Bar Music Centre (TBMC).

It was an enjoyable occasion, we were there to check out Brian's band - Audogenic - but more of that later.

First off, we had to negotiate the charitable donation as opposed to strict ticket entry portion of our visit to the TBMC. I didn't go the Homer Simpson route but instead swelled the coffers of this rather bizarre organisation to the tune of €10, for which I received a host of material about various immigrant services (money transfer, cheap phone calls, etc.) and a fetching little heart sticker which I pinned to myself in an effort to fit in.

We were in and then the weirdness happened, all the acts seemed intent on using classical spanish guitars eschewing the traditional steel string option probably on the basis of cost and ease on the fingers. Didgeridoos were inflicted on the audience, the connection with Poland was lost on me I must admit, and then further weirdness.

The Great Christmas Polish Charity Auctions!

Which went on all day... The highlight being (and I'm only going on guesswork here) the huge bid that got the signed volleyball from the Polish female volleyball team. A prized possession in any man's wardrobe! Certainly, the chap who bought it seemed chuffed.

And therein, lies my real gripe with the day, ok, it was a Polish event but it was supposed to be lauding multiculturalism and our MC, didn't feel it necessary to provide even a cursory English update to the audience. And there was a few of us non-Poles in it! It was nice to see immigrants out and having a good time though, generally it's like a caste society of socialising around Dublin, in the pubs and bars, young Irish boozin' it up goodo, an African doorman, a Polish barman and a harem of Chinese glass collectors. The only Poles, I've ever seen kicking back prior to this were huddled around flaming oil barrel fires in the outback of North County Dublin necking vodka in the freezing cold at an impressive rate. Of course, to them, it's probably a balmy evening. We have Polish language showings in the cinema now, Polish supplements in the evening papers, Lithuania food shops and check out the off licenses, the Vodka section is nearly 2 foot deep with all that variants from back East.

I'm getting worried to a degree that instead of being out and about and changing the Irish for the better, our immigrant friends are battening down the hatches and following the bad example of our own historical migrant communities. Eventually, an insular approach where the vast majority stick to their own communities during their expat existence seems to generally end in tears. Hopefully, that won't be the way it eventually plays out here...

Back to the gig and away from my ruminations, Audogenic rocked the house, in a sort of understated industrial electropop kind of way. I really enjoyed the material I got to hear and I'm looking forward to hearing more from this side of Brian's musical stable.

Considering that the rest of his stable is comprised of some very scary shit indeed.

Have a listen to Audogenic, you don't even need earplugs!